2001 Ford Explorer Sport Trac - old Brake Line - Photo 20

Part of going fast is knowing you can stop in a hurry when you need to. The stock front disc brakes are pretty good units straight from the factory and feature dual-piston calipers. Since a system is only as strong as its weakest point, we needed to improve our brake line setup before we found ourselves brakeless just at the wrong moment. We weren't there when these brake lines were mounted, but we suspect that they were mounted in conjunction with the bumpsteering, frame-cracking front end that we were in the process of replacing. The problem here wasn't poor materials, it was poor setup. The hard line and the flex line joined on the upper control arm. The flex line was too short, so our best guess is this brake line setup was a late-Friday or early-Monday fix. This situation meant that the hard line, not designed for constant flexing, had been constantly flexing as the control arm went up and down with the bumps. Very dangerous.